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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26284651">Past and Present</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonofsmiles/pseuds/dragonofsmiles'>dragonofsmiles</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Comics), The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Booker is alive but he’s somewhere else that’s why he’s not mentioned, Bottom Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, EVERYONE LOVES EACH OTHER, Everyone is immortal, F/F, Half octopus Joe, Historical Inaccuracy, Joe can turn into a human, Joe’s in heat people, Light Smut, Love, M/M, Nile and Booker aren’t mentioned in the story story, Nile isn’t immortal yet, Top Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, and Quynh is saved in this story, but I decided not to do that in this story, cause I just went with what popped up in my head, human Nicky, i don’t know, i hope you guys like it, like very light smut</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 07:20:14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,315</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26284651</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonofsmiles/pseuds/dragonofsmiles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Basically how they met, so it explains how Joe and Nicky met in past all while alternating between the past and present.<br/>Has happy ending for Andromache and Quynh.<br/>Everyone is happy and in love.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Andy | Andromache of Scythia &amp; Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Past</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hello peoples!<br/>I hope that you all enjoy my story as I’ve really wanted to see an AU where Joe and and Nicky are either Mer creatures, demons, angels or even Dragons.<br/>I’ve waited a while and have decided that since I’ve only seen one persons work do an AU where Joe is a prince and Nicky a pirate, I’ve made my own. This my very second fanfic so I hope you like it, I’ve done my best.<br/>Kudos is appreciated and thank you so much for taking time to read my story!😊</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>PRESENT</p>
<p>Joe’s POV</p>
<p>Joe was horny.. his tentacles swishing back and forth in the water impatiently.<br/>
Nicky would be back soon, and then he can have him.<br/>
His breeding cycle has come and he feels desperate, he wants to fill his beloved up until it looks like he’s about to burst.. so full of his seed, his tummy nice and round and plump. 
Joe had met Nicky when he was just a Crusader, he had been hunting for food when he decided to go towards the surface, and he was glad he did.
Joe keeps thinking back on the day when he met his beloved Nicky.

PAST
Year 1109:

He heard a vague commotion up above the water that day as he was looking for food, looking up towards shining blue surface, he was hesitant because many of his brothers and sisters had warned him of what happens to Mer creatures like themselves when they go above water, that humans were routhless and barbaric, stripping and taking and killing many creatures of the sea. </p>
<p>But his curiosity won out, so he went up and saw a few rocks near the shore, it was close but it wasn’t close enough that he’d be in any danger.<br/>
His head breached the water... and he watched.</p>
<p>When he breached the water he saw men, about six of them but only five of them were laughing, the sixth man was on the ground, after waiting around a while he witnessed the man on the ground start shouting, saying something that suddenly the other 5 men who Joe assumed were bandits had stopped laughing and started to scowl, suddenly one of the men shouted something at the other man who is on the sand and he says something back, he sees the man grin and then there was a sword in the sixth mans stomach, he dropped to the sand, blood seeping out around him. </p>
<p>The bandits left after that but Joe decided to wait a little longer, Joe thought the man on the ground was dead or at least he thought he was, the man would make an easy meal and he was hungry, so he got out of the water clawed/slithered up to the shore not without some difficulty of course. He was made for the water not the land so he struggled, but when he got to the body he realized with shock and bated breath that the man before him who he watched get slain by the dagger of one of the bandits, blood that seeped into the sand as proof of this mans death, was waking up.</p>
<p>Joe was surprised to see another like him, but to be sure he grabbed a dagger from the mans belt and carefully cut the mans hand only to see it heal up.<br/>
Joe did not fear death as he cannot die, he learned this after he had been mauled by a great big shark, his three tentacles that had been previously ripped to shreds had grown back after he had woken up gasping in pain looking wildly for the danger that he was previously in. He’s died many times after that as well.<br/>
He was young then but after many years of growing and training to be deadly/stealthy he has become stronger and thus harder to kill.</p>
<p>Joe stares at the man before him, and when he finally does open his eyes Joe can’t help but release a small gasp. They were the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen, they were like a pale green ocean trapped in two small pools. It didn’t help that the man was also gorgeous. </p>
<p>Nicolò’s POV<br/>
Pain. Pain everywhere, it was burning but also thankfully fading as his skin has healed up now.<br/>
Nicolo kept his eyes closed, he remembers insulting the bandits that had caught him off guard while he was bathing, they ordered him to put on some clothes, his tunic would be ruined now.</p>
<p>He’s been stabbed before, when he was fighting for the Holy land. But when the Crusaders won and infiltrated Jerusalem he felt sick, men, women, even children were being murdered, women raped, men being beaten, the children screaming in fear as their throats were cut by men he knew, men he viewed as comrades.<br/>
He got out of there quickly, this was not God’s will. This was man’s greed.<br/>
It was a few days later that he found a horse after having starved to death. He found a merchant and bought some food with the little armour he had left.<br/>
He had tossed the uniform that the militia had provided him and the other soldiers. It was two days later that he was caught by the bandits.</p>
<p>He did not like being dragged behind a horse, his (stolen) horse specifically. But alas.<br/>
He could hear them talking, it’s been years since he left the battle field, years of learning their language and he is glad it has payed off. They were all speaking Arabic but he understands them fully.<br/>
The man in charge intends to sell him. “Make a pretty penny” he hears one of them say. He isn’t happy with that outcome but he’ll escape, because there is no way he will be sold to rich scum who sit in their luxurious homes while he and many other men had died fighting in a war that was purely made out of mans greed for more land and more power.</p>
<p>He refuses to be their servant, so as soon as they’ve settled down at some beach, he hears the men laugh and decides now will be a good as time as any to initiate the plan he had conjured up while having been dragged behind the horses.<br/>
He insults them.</p>
<p>“You are scum.. men who take advantage of others when they are weak, you are cowards” this caught their attention as they’ve stopped laughing and are now scowling at him.<br/>
Good, Nicolo wants them angry, needs them to be angry. He wants them to kill him, to leave him there and think that they’ve killed him, but he knows that when he dies, he knows he’ll come back, and then he’ll be free.<br/>
This beach doesn’t seem so bad, he spotted a cave a little further up where some jagged looking rocks seemed to have formed. He could stay there for a bit and then move on and look for a city.</p>
<p>He keeps insulting the men until one of them shouts at him to shut the fuck up.<br/>
But he keeps on going and looks directly at the man and says “you kiss your mother with that mouth?”<br/>
He’s grinning, he knows he’s got them, the man who told him to shut up is now standing, grabbing a dagger and is racing forward, his eyes angry with rage and hatred.</p>
<p>It hurts, but it is to be expected. Dying always hurts, so he braced himself before the man plunged the dagger into his chest.<br/>
He feels himself fall, he sees something in the corner of his eye, something long and black slithering in the water, he assumes that it is just his imagination. Darkness sweeps him up and before he knows it, he’s gone.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Present</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Nicolo’s POV</p>
<p>He feels himself waking, the dagger having been taken out by the very man who killed him before he died. He can feel his skin stitching itself back together.</p>
<p>It’s warm and he does not want to get up yet. The suns rays feel nice on his skin and he’s soaking it in, until something blocks that very warmth out.</p>
<p>Curious, but now also weary, slowly tenses his body so that he is ready to run (or kill, thankfully his sword was not touched, still next to his body on the sand beside him) he opens his eyes and is shocked, all he can see is brown, a beautiful brown that he has not seen before, it makes him stare, to want look into those eyes forever.</p>
<p>That is until he starts to look at the mans features and finally comprehends that he is looking at a very shocked face, yet, relieved? face.<br/>A handsome face no less, with brown curly hair, and beautiful unblemished light brown skin that seems to glow from the touch of the sun. He looks down... and he stares.</p>
<p>He’s shocked and does not know what to do, does not know what he is looking at, cannot comprehend what he is seeing.<br/>This person, if he even is a person, has eight tentacles, a dark black that could challenge the darkest night, the tentacles move up a bit and he can see that the suckers are a paler black underneath.</p>
<p>He hears the creature gasp and snaps his eyes back up to their face. He mind keeps telling him to run, to get up and run but he can’t move. </p>
<p>The creature before him moves slowly, carefully as if it does not want to spook him. (He wants to laugh at that as it is usually the other way around. But he decides against it) The man put its hands up and looks at him in a way that seems like it’s trying to reassure him. </p>
<p>One of the mans tentacles grabs his sword, Nicolo tenses up further. He can feel the fear build up now, but it is quickly diminished as the man cuts his hand and shows his clearly healing yet bloody hand to Nicolo. He feels confused but when the flesh has finished healing he can’t help but feel relief. <br/>Relieved, that he isn’t alone any more, even if it seems that this (curse? Gift?) is shared with a tentacled man. He looks at the other now, his vision has become clearer and he can’t help but feel that he looks familiar. </p>
<p>His dreams come to him suddenly. <br/>A man underwater, black, caves, fish, beaches, a shark, blood. (Two women riding horses, fighting together).</p>
<p>Nicolo gasps and quickly sits up, this startles the octopus man (at least he’s pretty sure he’s an octopus) “you.” He can’t help but say. “You are from my dreams!” He feels excited but he can see the man before him is confused but recognition starts to spark in his eyes. “You speak my language?” The man replies, he is surprised. </p>
<p>(I couldn’t be bothered to find Arabic translations. And there is no magical mer language).</p>
<p>But most people are, when he replies in Arabic to them as he is clearly from another country as if his pale complexion has anything to say about it.</p>
<p>This was how they met and this was how their love had formed.</p>
<p>Present:<br/>Joe’s POV</p>
<p>Nicolo has come down now, Joe can hear his beloveds footsteps, will recognise them anywhere after loving him for over 900 years, they are happy together, the two women that they used to dream about visited a lot.</p>
<p>(Back in the past again, sorry 😅 once I have something in my head I tend to put it down randomly and just keep going)</p>
<p>They became family and when he heard that Andromache and Qungh had been separated, and quite cruely, his felt his drop into his stomach. </p>
<p>Hearing Andromache say that they put Qungh into an iron Maiden and dropped her in the middle of no where in ocean angered him to his very core. This was his family, and he would do anything in his power to get Quynh back.</p>
<p>They searched for her for many years, always coming back up empty handed, Andy looking sullen and barely talks unless they have another lead. <br/>Until one day Joe saw bubbles coming from the ocean floor while he was searching for food to bring back to his Nicolo and Andromache.</p>
<p>As he got closer he could hear faint screams being expelled into the water.<br/>They cut off and then they started again, Joe got closer, the little feeling of hope starting to clamber it’s way into his heart. He saw something big and weirdly shaped at the bottom of the ocean floor. He swam closer and when he peered into what seemed to be eye holes there were bubbles in his face and the screaming was as clearer then ever. </p>
<p>Quickly he looked back down and to his shock and relief he sees Qungh.<br/>He looks at the lock that has been holding his dear friend prisoner and finds a hard rock that he bashes against the lock. <br/>It breaks and he speedily brings Qungh to the surface.</p>
<p>She breaths and gasps, and thanks Yusuf over and over again and again.<br/>She’s crying and by the time he gets them both to the boat that Nicolo had got the three of them, Andromache is standing there. Her eyes wide with disbelief, and then she’s running to the side of the boat and hauling Qungh into her arms.<br/>They cry together, holding onto each other as if they’re in a dream and if one of lets go they’ll wake up to empty arms.</p>
<p>(Present😅)</p>
<p>Joe snaps out of it when he hears Nicolo say something to him. He asks Nicoló to repeat himself and he hears “I asked if you were feeling ok?, it is breeding season for you so I brought some foods and water as well as lube, just in case”.<br/>Joe snorts because of course his beloved knew he was horny.<br/>One of his tentacles slide up to where Nicolo, (now Nicky as they have changed their names during the decades) is sitting, up on the ledge close to the water. The tentacle crawls up his leg and goes up, up, up until it reaches his pants and it keeps slithering until it finally reaches Nicky’s boxers.</p>
<p>He hears Nicky exhale and he decides to climb up and take what he now wants so desperately.</p>
<p>Forgetting his thoughts of the past.</p>
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